In the management of local area networks and other networks which may have a multiplicity of users, it is necessary for a policy server to locate a switch, hereinafter called ‘edge switch’, to which a user is attached and to apply user based policy rules to that switch.
In this specification, ‘switch’ is intended to refer to a multi-port device which is capable of responding to address data within addressed data packets to direct those packets to a port or ports in accordance with the address data. The invention requires such a switch to be configurable so that packets passing through any particular port may be ‘snooped’, that is to say examined by appropriate processing circuits associated with that port to divert selected type of packets to a ‘management agent’ for processing. Such switches are known and are commercially available. One example is the 3Com Super Stack II switch 3300, made by 3Com Corporation of Santa Clara, Calif.